Community Advice Ards and North Down helps people resolve many problems including debt, social security benefits, housing, legal, health, discrimination, employment, immigration, tax, relationship and consumer issues.

Community Advice Ards and North Down is a registered charity reliant on trained advisers (both paid and volunteer) and funded by money from Ards and North Down Borough Council, the Department for Communities and MacMillan Cancer Support. This helps us to provide and maintain a vital service to local communities.

We aim to provide the advice people need for the problems they face and improve the policies and practices that affect people's lives.

We provide free, independent, confidential and impartial advice to everyone on their rights and responsibilities. We value diversity, promote equality and challenge discrimination.

Community Advice Ards and North Down comprises the Ards, Bangor and Holywood offices and is part of the wider Community Advice family within Northern Ireland

Community Advice deals with over thousands of issues across a wide range of advice categories.

We also represent the public at many social security appeal tribunals each year.

Advice is available to all communities across Northern Ireland.

Our Principles

Community Advice service is independent and provides free, confidential and impartial advice to everybody regardless of race, gender, sexuality, age, nationality, disability or religion:

Independent - Community Advice is an independent charity working in partnership with others to improve access to advice;

Free - Community Advice services are free;

Confidential - the client's visit and the nature of their enquiry are not divulged to anyone outside Community Advice;

Impartial - Community Advice puts the client's interest first and provides information, advice and assistance to enable people to make informed decisions.

Our Aims

To ensure that individuals do not suffer through lack of knowledge of their rights and responsibilities or of the services available to them, or through an inability to express their needs effectively;

To exercise a responsible influence on the development of social policies and services, both locally and nationally.

Privacy Policy

At Community Advice we collect and use your personal information to help solve your problems, improve our services and tackle wider issues in society that affect people's lives.

We only ask for the information we need. We always let you decide what you're comfortable telling us, explain why we need it and treat it as confidential.

When we record and use your personal information we:

only access it when we have a good reason

only share what is necessary and relevant

don't sell it to anyone

We handle and store your personal information in line with the law.

Cookies

Community Advice Ards and North Down does not use cookies, we do not collect any type of data called cookies.

Website Disclaimer

Community Advice Ards and North Down has tried to ensure that the information on this website is accurate. However, CommunityAdvice Ards and North Down will not accept liability for any loss, damage or inconvenience arising as a consequence of any use of or the inability to use any information on this website. Community Advice Ards and North Down endeavours to provide a service of the highest quality. However, we cannot guarantee that our service will be uninterrupted or error-free. We are not responsible for claims brought by third parties arising from your use of this website.

Community Advice Ards and North Down assumes no responsibility for the contents of linked websites. The inclusion of any link should not be taken as endorsement of any kind by Community Advice Ards and North Down, of the linked website or any association with its operators. Further, we have no control over the availability of the linked pages.

Copyright

Material on this website, including text and images, is protected by copyright. It may not be copied, reproduced, republished, downloaded, posted, broadcast or transmitted in any way except for your own personal, non-commercial use. Prior written consent of the copyright holder must be obtained for any other use of material. Copyright in all materials and/or works comprising or contained within this website remains with Community Advice Ards and North Down and other copyright owner(s) as specified. No part of this site may be distributed or copied for any commercial purpose.

Complaints Policy

Who to complain to...

Service Manager

Community Advice Ards and North Down
Hamilton Road Community Hub
39A Hamilton Road
Bangor
BT20 4LF

We want everyone who uses Community Advice Ards and North Down to be happy with the service we provide. That’s why, if we’ve let you down, we want to hear from you – no matter how big or small the issue is. Often, we’ll be able to put things right. Even when we can’t, knowing where we’ve gone wrong will help us do better in the future. We promise to deal with every complaint quickly, professionally and confidentially.

Ask Community Advice Ards and North Down to resolve the problem

It’s important for us to know what we’ve done wrong, so we can do our best to put it right. Don’t be afraid to speak to the Service Manager in your the Ards, Bangor or Holywood office. They will often be able to solve the problem straight away. If they can’t, or you’re still not happy, you can make a formal complaint.

Making a formal complaint

You can write a letter explaining what happened and send it to the address above. Your complaint will be investigated by our Service Manager, if it’s upheld, we’ll apologise fully – and, if appropriate, let you know what we’re doing to put things right. We will acknowledge your complaint within 5 days. We will investigate and provide a full response in 8 weeks. If it’s going to take longer than this, we’ll explain why and keep you informed of progress.

Asking for a review

If you feel we haven’t dealt with your complaint properly, or you aren’t satisfied with the outcome, you can ask us to review the decision. Please make sure you ask for this within five days of receiving the decision. This review will be carried out by the Executive Director of Community Advice. This will be acknowledged within 5 working days. Once this has been completed a copy of the Community Advice review will be sent to you and the Community Advice Ards and North Down Chair.

Using an independent adjudicator

If you are still not happy with the decision, you can refer your complaint to an independent adjudicator. An independent adjudicator is someone unconnected with Community Advice who will decide whether we’ve dealt with your complaint fairly. The request for an independent adjudicator review should be made within 4 weeks of receiving the Community Advice Ards and North Down review. Requests submitted outside of this period will be considered as a reasonable adjustment or if there are extenuating circumstances.